SGI 2024 | Israel | Key Challenges

Key Challenges

Recent Governments Experts

SGI experts on Israel

Ilana Shpaizman

Ilana Shpaizman is a Senior Lecturer (US Assistant professor) at the Department of Political Studies, Bar Ilan University. She holds a PhD from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and she did a post doc at the University of Austin at Texas. Her research interests are gradual policy changes, policy ideas, agenda setting, the policy process, immigration policy, and American and Israeli policy.

Ronen Mandelkern

Dr. Ronen Mandelkern is a faculty member at the School of Political Science, Government and International Affairs at Tel Aviv University. Mandelkern was a Fellow of the Polonsky Academy at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute (2011-2016) and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies in Cologne (2010-2011). His research deals with the political analysis of economic liberalization processes and the neoliberal economy, and focuses on the influence of experts, ideas and institutions on the evolution of these processes in Israel and abroad.

César Colino (Coordinator)

César Colino is associate professor at the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at the Spanish National Distance-Learning University (UNED) in Madrid. He has taught at the University of Salamanca and the Autonomous University of Madrid and has been visiting researcher at the Max-Planck Institute for the Study of Society (MPIfG) in Cologne and Research Officer at the Institute for Research in Public Administration (FöV) in Speyer, Germany. His recent research and publications have addressed issues of comparative public policy and administration, comparative federalism, and constitutional reform in federations with a focus on the Spanish, German and Canadian federal systems. He has published in journals such as Policy & Politics; Comparative European Politics; Public Administration; Regional & Federal Studies; and Publius: The Journal of Federalism. He has recently published a book on comparative administration (in Spanish) Gobiernos y administraciones públicas en perspectiva comparada, Valencia: 2013 (with S. Parrado y J. Olmeda), and is the author of the forthcoming chapter “National and European patterns of public administration and governance,” in the Handbook of European Politics, José M. Magone ed. London: Routledge (with Eloísa del Pino).

Israel has a deep-rooted history of improvisation in policymaking (Sharkansky and Zalmanovitch 2000). When it comes to long-term processes and strategic planning, Israel typically demonstrates weak policy performance. Although improvisation can be advantageous in uncertain environments, it creates challenges in addressing long-term global issues. Furthermore, this approach becomes problematic when policy responses necessitate collaboration between various national and international actors.

One mechanism that can support strategic planning and implementation is a strong central coordination agency. The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) could fulfill this role. However, over the last couple of years, the capacity of the PMO has decreased, mostly due to politicization and the level of coordination between ministries. Israel’s government should invest more heavily in strengthening the PMO, especially its strategic planning and coordination departments.

These departments and the general director should play a more active role in coordinating and managing collaboration between ministries and effectively monitoring the implementation of various projects. Currently, this task is primarily conducted by the Ministry of Finance, which is responsible for fiscal and economic issues, while professional input from other perspectives is lacking. One way to strengthen the PMO is to set higher formal standards for the general director of the PMO.

The Israeli government tends to adopt strategic plans on issues seen as global problems, with specific goals and measures developed by external actors, and formalized in treaties and agreements. In addition, international actors, such as the OECD, should develop measures for domestic issues, similarly formalized in treaties and agreements. This might induce the government to act on these measures, and translate them into specific policy responses and strategies.

The second challenge is accountability. Israeli policymakers and authorities often do not see themselves as accountable to the public. This deeply affects issues placed on the agenda and policy implementation. To improve accountability, the legislature’s monitoring capacity should be strengthened. Specifically, the number of members of the Knesset should be increased, so that they can effectively participate in Knesset committee meetings and provide the committees with more effective monitoring tools. Additionally, the State Comptroller’s Office should be strengthened. Currently, the state comptroller has broad investigative authority; however, its reports are non-binding and often ignored by policymakers. The state comptroller’s reports include important information on gaps in sustainable governance. Increasing the power of the state comptroller would contribute to the better implementation of these reports.

Although freedom of information provisions have been improved, the department of the Ministry of Justice in charge of freedom of information is very small and has little power. To further improve the provision of government information and thereby strengthen accountability, the ministerial department should be expanded and provided with the coercive authority to address deviations from the Freedom of Information Law.

A third challenge concerns vertical coordination. More formal coordination mechanisms should be implemented and greater authority delegated to local authorities. This will improve government responsiveness. At the same time, institutionalizing mechanisms of collaborative governance should be enhanced, providing more influence to various stakeholders, and contributing to the democratization and accountability of policymaking (Sher-Hadar et al. 2021).

The past year has demonstrated the power of civil society. A vibrant civil society will be crucial for sustaining democracy. It can also increase responsiveness and communication between government and citizens. Both national and international actors are encouraged to strengthen Israeli civil society. However, this empowerment should enable civil society to work with the government, not replace it.

Of course, addressing these challenges greatly depends on how the war in Gaza evolves, and its national and international consequences. The political arrangements adopted following the war will significantly impact the government’s willingness to promote and fulfill non-security-related strategic goals.

Citations:

Sharkansky, Ira, and Yair Zalmanovitch. 2000. “Improvisation in Public Administration and Policy Making in Israel.” Public Administration Review 60 (4): 321-329.

Sher-Hadar, N., Lahat, L., and Galnoor, I., eds. 2021. Collaborative Governance: Theory and Lessons from Israel. Cham: Springer International Publishing.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45807-2